I wrote a whole diatribe about how I do work… it’s just from home. And maybe I will post that spiel, but I’d love to tell you more than just about my work, and I’d like some credit, too.
I truly enjoy blogging, but it is still work and scheduling and making sure that your content is rich, your pictures fully edited and watermarked (because people steal) and your stories are fruitful, and… that you’ve syndicated and SEO’d and hashtagged and no-followed and renamed and pinned and liked and reposted and tweeted and retweeted and GoogledPlussed and flickr’d and Tumblr’d and StumbledUpon and Digg’d and followed and then logged all of those links. It’s not just that writing pays pennies, literally pennies, and you have to wait for a minimum amount before you get paid for some jobs and that can take months. It’s not just the the conference calls I work in between naps and lunch… if that’s how you define the handful of dried fruit I had at 5pm. It’s not just all of this.
It’s the thousands of stay-at-home-parents out there who make sure that laundry is folded, or some semblance of such an act (have you ever tried to fold laundry with a toddler in close range?), that dinner is prepped, that the kids are fed and mostly clean, that the mail is organized and that the dog was fed. It’s the everyday life of the homemaker.
And I am that. I make this home. This is not a house. This is the home where Dave sighs when he walks in the door as he’s reached his place of rest. This is a place where friends are welcome. Where the floors are usually clean and the kitchen well stocked with goodies we made as a lesson- to measure, to pour, to mix and stir, to shake and to taste- currently it’s oatmeal white chocolate and fresh cranberry cookies! There are a few candles for comfort and lots of blankets for warmth. The garden is tended and the gate creaks with charm to welcome you. This is the home we brought Addie home to. The home we built to live our ever after (or as long as it suits our needs!). And I like to think I cultivated it, especially in the last 19 months.
That is not all, however. I also do the things on the “Honey Do” list that seem to get bumped. Things that we forget those who are home are forced to run into day after day. The bumping cabinet door, the peeling paint on the shed, the broken bookends, the project that won’t wait forever…
Because this won’t fix itself, but those 2 precious hours of naptime are the perfect opportunity:
Because hanging out in the cold weather on the roof of my shed was what I had in mind:
Because clearly, all I do all day is play with the baby:
I raise my glass of lukewarm water (filled with backwash from a toddler) to you homemaker parents. While we get the joy of seeing all the firsts, we also get all of the repeats. The repeat falls, the repeat wants and demands, the repeat diapers. We get the leaky faucet and the one spot of chipped paint that haunts our sleep. We get 2 hours a day to complete the work of 6. We aren’t just homemakers, we are homemaking. Everyday reworking our tactics and honing our skills to create the best environment for those we care for.
And we love it.
Beautifully said. On the other side of Mommyhood —- Grandparenthood and retirement and blogging and Caregiving —- I think not a day goes by when someone tells me how “lucky” I am to be a Grandma, retired and working from home. The fantasy (for them!) is how I wake up, stretch big and wide, hop into a warm bath with scented bath salts, wander off to a local cafe for coffee and perusal of the morning news, then wander back home to change into my running gear, shower quickly, meet friends for lunch at cute little cafes in magical locations, shop for dinner on my way home in European-style butcher/fish shops, bake treats for Barry and spend the evening drinking wine and chatting about our days before I whip up a post or two by candlelight as Barry brings me my slippers.
You and my daughters and bloggers know the challenges of this work, the love of this work, the spirit of this work, the deadlines of this work AND the joys of the independence and choice of this work.
And how it changes day to day, week to week, month to month.
I never started out to be a Caregiving writer. This evolved as my life evolved. I wasn’t a runner when I began blogging. I am now and I get work for this. I DID start out as a diarist of my grandkids’ daily wonders, and I still do this!
But all the stuff in-between!? I try to explain to friends what I do, and most don’t get past the “lucky” part… the fun events, the sometimes travel, the meeting interesting people, the writing, etc. Then I ALWAYS remind these friends and relatives that I worked for 30 years, teaching – my passion – when many of these same people took lots of years off to be with their kids, see their “firsts”, etc. I didn’t have that luxury. I do now. I have TIME to do what I want… which is organizing my time to try to fit in everybody I love and everything I want to do. It’s not easy. But it’s the lifestyle I choose. I’m always honing. That’s what we do!
I love this post. xox!
Sharon – MomGenerations.com recently posted…Daily Photo: These girly eyes…
I love your full life and your drive, passion and continuing to create everyday. For you, for your children ams grands, for Barry and for your readers.
How blessed I am to know you <3
I find it very hard to balance everything! There are so many times when I want to take a day and slow down! Your home is gorgeous because it is you, Addie, and your hubby (who I got the pleasure to meet:)
I’m so glad we met each other’s sometimes better half! 🙂 I find balance to be so relative to my varying days that there’s never true balance. Only keeping on with a smile!